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SAMUEL ELIOT, LL.D. 



REMARKS 



ON THE CHARACTER OF 



SAMUEL ELIOT, LL.D. 

MADE AT A MEETING OF THE 

MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY, 

October 13, 1898. 

BY THE REV. EDMUND F/SLAFTER, D. D. 



REPRINTED FROM THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL 

SOCIETY. 



CAMBRIDGE: 
JOHN WILSON AND SON. 

2&tttterstt2 ^ress, 
1899. 



Gilt 

Author 






REMARKS 



The President announced the death of Samuel Eliot, LL.D., 
a Resident Member, who died at his summer home in Beverly, 
September 14, 1898, and called on the Rev. Dr. Slafter, who 
spoke in substance as follows : — 

Mr. President, — Called upon unexpectedly, what I have to 
say must be desultory, brief, and incomplete. Dr. Eliot gradu- 
ated at Harvard College, I think in 1839. He soon after went 
abroad, and passed some time in foreign travel. After he 
returned from Europe, he built or purchased a cottage on the 
borders of Brookline, and became a member of St. John's 
Church, Jamaica Plain, of which I was at that time the Rector. 
Mr. Eliot at once threw himself into the interests of the parish. 
He offered to give instruction to any class of young people, 
if there were such in the parish, who could be profited by his 
aid. He took charge of the music, organized a choir, played 
the organ, and held weekly sessions for practice and training 
in the music of the Church. I mention this because it was 
early in his career, and illustrates what was characteristic of 
him to the end of his life. He was always ready to do what- 



ever lay within the sphere of his influence to improve and 
elevate all classes of men, morally, physically, intellectually, 
and religiously. 

Dr. Eliot appears never to have desired to enter any of the 
learned professions. On my first visit to him in his attractive 
little cottage in Brookline, he told me that he was neither rich 
nor poor, and that he intended to pursue no profession except 
that of the scholar. To this purpose he adhered. He was, 
I think, at that time writing his history of Liberty, which 
appeared first in two thick octavo, and subsequently in four 
octavo volumes of about four hundred pages each, the first 
two treating of the u Ancient Romans," the last two of the 
" Early Christians." Had this work first appeared to-day it 
would doubtless have had a much wider reading, as a vastly 
greater interest in historical studies has been awakened in the 
last forty years. 

Dr. Eliot occupied numerous important official positions. 
He was connected with Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut, 
for the period of eighteen years, eight years as Professor of 
History and Political Science, and ten years as Lecturer on 
Constitutional Law and Political Science, three years of which 
period he was President of the College. After his return 
to Massachusetts he was for some time Superintendent of the 
Public Schools of the City of Boston, Head Master of the 
Girls' High School, and a member of the School Committee. 
Whether he held these offices in the order of time in which I 
have mentioned them, I know not. In all these different 
official relations he discharged his duty with eminent satisfac- 
tion. I have never known a pupil who had been under his 



instruction, who did not speak of him as a teacher with un- 
qualified admiration and gratitude. 

Dr. Eliot was especially distinguished as a public speaker. 
His style was simple, direct, clear, and persuasive, with no ex- 
pletives and rarely any superlatives. In the quality of his 
matter, in the graceful method of its presentation, in the quiet 
dignity of his presence, and the richness of his voice, he had, 
during the last years of his life, no peer in the city of Boston. 
I call to mind a few of the occasions when he delivered dis- 
courses which have been embalmed in print. An address be- 
fore the Episcopal Charitable Society, a venerable institution, 
limited to a hundred members, established as early as 1724 ; 
an oration before the city authorities of Boston on the Fourth 
of July, 1868 ; a paper read before the Seventh Church Con- 
gress in Providence, Rhode Island ; an address in Commemo- 
ration of the Hon. William Appleton, the founder of St. 
Stephen's Chapel in Boston ; an address at St. Paul's School 
in Concord, New Hampshire ; an address on the Centennial 
of Washington's Inauguration, delivered in Christ Church, 
Boston ; an address at the dedicatory service of the new school 
building of St. Mark's School, Southborough, Massachusetts ; 
a eulogy on the Rt. Rev. Phillips Brooks, D.D. ; a memorial 
address on Dr. George Cheyne Shattuck, the founder of St. 
Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire ; an address at 
Trinity College on his inauguration as President ; " Early 
Relations with the Indians," a discourse in the course, at the 
Lowell Institute, by members of the Massachusetts Historical 
Society. These constitute only an incomplete list of the dis- 
courses which he delivered on public occasions. Besides these 



6 

public addresses, we must not fail to mention his " Biography 
of Montgomery Ritchie " ; his " Paper on Civil Service Reform," 
in the publications of the American Social Science Associa- 
tion ; and his " Manual of United States History," a bulky 
twelvemo, which passed through several editions. 

Dr. Eliot held many important trusts. He was a trustee 
and member of the executive committee of the Museum of 
Fine Arts; president of the Boston Athenasum ; president 
and trustee of the Massachusetts Bible Society ; president of 
the Perkins Institution and Massachusetts School for the 
Blind, and doubtless some others. With all these institu- 
tions he identified himself in a warm, unflagging, practical 
interest. He was a conscientious, broad-minded, large-hearted, 
and efficient worker in every good cause which appealed to 
the conservative philanthropist or the devout Christian. I 
fear it will be long before the place made vacant by his death 
can be adequately filled. 



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